


Seventy-Six Points

by loveandpride1895



Category: Bohemian Rhapsody (Movie 2018), Queen (Band)
Genre: Angst, Banter, Depression, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Humour, If you think the tags and description don't marry up..., aherm, blink and you'll miss it reference to depression, harold wants Bri not to do the queen thing, parental angst, read and find out, read:attempt at, tour bus scrabble shenanigans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-26
Updated: 2019-05-26
Packaged: 2020-03-17 13:42:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,150
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18966403
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/loveandpride1895/pseuds/loveandpride1895
Summary: Brian wins a game of scrabble.





	Seventy-Six Points

**Author's Note:**

> Your regularly scheduled instalment of 'cleaning out my old un-posted stuff until I have time to finish my half-finished fic.

\- **Quixotic** -

"The actual fuck does that mean?"

Brian motions towards John with his head, who has been leafing through the dictionary since the "Q" tile was lain. He holds up a finger to encourage patience, then begins to drag it down the page. After a moment, he gives it two little taps.

"Not sensible about practical matters. Idealistic and unrealistic."

Roger huffs, pouts and folds his arms. The three actions are given clear boundaries for maximum effect. Brian tries his very best to slap a humble smile over his smug one. Fails.

Freddie - designated scribe, with Ratty employed to look over his shoulder and check for cheating; getting incredibly bored - picks up the pencil and twirls it around his forefinger and thumb. "How many is that to Bri then?"

"Seventy-six," Brian pipes up cheerfully.

"That right Deaks?"

"Afraid so." Less cheerful.

Roger narrows his eyes.

"How do you know that word? You hiding cheat sheets in your hair?"

Brian smirks and ducks his head to shove his (especially bird's nest like - tour bus shower) hair up Roger's nose, receiving an indignant squeal and a knee to the neck. "Smell any cheat sheets?"

"No, alright, alright. Fuck off."

He does, and settles leisurely into the sofa cushions.

"I don't know how I know that word, I just do."

Freddie kicks him lightly on the knee. "Bet you read the dictionary, don't you dear. Every night. That'd be a very you thing to do."

John nods his head in ironically sincere agreement.

Brian tries to roll his eyes indignantly, but betrays himself by letting out a snorty chuckle.

"Yeah Fred, tell yourself that if you like."

***

It was on second twenty-four of tense, rigid silence that Harold finally spoke.

"I want you to think about this very carefully, Brian, very carefully indeed."

Brian braced himself against the kitchen table. Took a moment to feel the wood beneath his fingers, the air rushing up his nose. When he spoke the sound rattled from the bottom of his throat.

"What do you think I've been doing for the last... However many years, Dad? I've been tossing and turning and tearing my hair out in chunks and trying to wrap my head around what's the right bloody-"

"Language."

"What's the right _blooming_ thing to do, and this is the conclusion - the carefully calculated, in no way rash conclusion - that I've come to."

"Really?"

The intonation was of a question but the tone invited nothing but silence. Harold's eyes were dark and dangerous as he rose. He wasn't imposing in stature nor nature, and had to crane his neck to meet his son's eyes but the disapproval was coming off him in waves and threatened to drown them both.

"That big brain of yours and you're honestly trying to tell me that the conclusion you've come to is that the right thing to do is to the modern day equivalent of running away to join the circus?"

Brian barked out a humourless laugh.

"Dad..." He ran a hand through his hair and a few strands came away in his fingers. He nearly threw them at Harold to make a point, but let them float to the floor instead. "I know... That's what it looks like. I really do, but you have to understand... There's merit in this, there really is. The band is... It's-"

"Four students wasting their time."

 _"Going places._ Really, seriously. And maybe if you took the time to listen to some of our-"

"Oh for goodness-"

"Come to a show or two, sit in on a recording session, maybe then you'd get it."

Harold sighed heavily and reached into his trouser pocket. Brian watched with a line set into his forehead as he lit a cigarette and took a long, passionate drag. The smoke wafted up his nose like mustard gas and he winced.

"Brian, if I went to one of your shows... Or watched you and your friends playing around on your instruments, all that would happen is I'd be unable to fight the urge to drag you by the ear back to the laboratory." A note of sadness began to settle over his face and Brian chose to file the harsh truth away for a moment in favour of watching this minute emotional shift curiously. "Once upon a time you couldn't be dragged away. From your work. From the stars."

A bittersweet smile had settled over Harold's face and Brian took his cue to play his trump card.

"You built the guitar."

Harold's smile turned more bitter than sweet.

"Yes."

"Why? If you didn't want me to play it. Why?"

"Oh for goodness-" Harold stumped out the cigarette on the kitchen table, leaving a termite-mound of ash in its wake. Ruth was going to be furious. "I did want you to play, of course I wanted you to play. _Because I was worried about you._ I wanted you to have a hobby, something to get you out of that melancholy head of yours for half an hour a day, not as something to pull the rug of success out from under your feet. Because you could be so successful, the things you could discover, the places you could go. What you could do for humanity, the legacy you could leave, you could... You could be a legend Brian."

' _Stardom_ ,' Brian nearly said, in a dialect of his internal monologue that had recently developed and sounded oddly like Freddie. _'I'm going to do that not with the stars... But with stardom.'_

Instead, he blinked at his father as he trembled with emotion. And fear, he realised.

Deep emotion, deep fear.

"You're being so quixotic, Brian, so... _Foolish_. Please, please don't do this."

His voice cracked on the second 'please.' Brian had never heard his voice crack before. He pulled out one of the dining chairs, wrinkling his nose in discomfort at the groan it made against the wooden floor. Sat down heavily. He opened his mouth to speak. To speak about how the stars would always be there, but the music was a once in a lifetime opportunity, one which made him feel alive in a way that nothing else ever had nor would and the prospect of which made him get out of bed every morning.

But the sound of footsteps behind him, quietly leaving the room, made him close it.

Only after he was alone in the dining room did he realise that he'd given his father the last word.

'Quixotic,' he thought, in an attempt to think about anything else. 'I'll have to look that up.'

***

"So I'm winning then am I?"

"You know you are, bastard."

"Language."

"What?"

"Nothing. Sorry. Eff and Jeff all you want."

"Who the fuck is Jeff?"

"Just... Carry on playing."

Roger gives him a funny look, before defeatedly adding an 'm' to Freddie's 'at' to make 'mat.'

"I'll get you back one day."

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading, lovelies!! Comments are the lifeblood of the fic author, so please leave one if you have the time.
> 
> Have a lovely day!


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